The Beginning of the End of the Public University, by Rodolfo "Rudy" Acuña, Ph.D.

This historical perspective reflecting on the student movement of the 1960s and early 70s by Dr. Rudy Acuña is helpful as we deconstruct the political moment we're in with respect to civil rights and higher education. I would definitely read this in tandem with a recent historical and important post titled, "The Free Speech Movement at Sixty and Today’s Unfree Universities" by Robert Cohen, AAUP. One of more insightful comments from Dr. Acuña's piece is the following:

"Tom Hayden in an article on Mario Savio argued that “The current era of privatization and neoliberalism was born in Berkeley as a countermovement to the ’60s.” We did not see what was on the horizon, too caught up with our perceived victories perhaps to see a reaction building that would change higher education."

We need a new student movement to reign in neoliberalism that envisions and works toward a more equitable and sustainable future, prioritizing social justice, diversity and inclusion, environmental stewardship, and collective well-being over profit and exploitation. To move in this direction, we must consider what a caring university and economy might be, both of which exist in reciprocal relationship to Mother Earth. On that note,

Merry Christmas! Feliz Navidad! Joyeux Noël, Buon Natale, Feliz Natal, 圣诞快乐 (Shèngdàn Kuàilè), С Рождеством (S Rozhdestvom), Nollaig Shona, मैरी क्रिसमस (Meri Christmas), Mutlu Noeller, Весела Коледа (Vesela Koleda), Frohe, Weihnachten, Happy Hanukkah, & Happy Kwanzaa!!! 

-Angela Valenzuela

"They tried to bury us, but they didn’t know we were seeds."

-Chicana/Chicano/Indigenous Proverb

The Beginning of the End of the Public University
Rudy Acuña: We were too young, naive or preoccupied with the Vietnam War, campus turmoil and the excitement of times to recognize the significance of the changes.

by Rodolfo F. Acuña | Jan 19, 2015 LA Progressive

“The best of times …the worst of times.”
The 1960s were “the best of times …the worst of times.” As one author put it, a backlash was underway that marked the “Slow Death of Public Higher Education.” In less than a decade California went from Master Plan to No Plan. The ill wind was ushered in by Ronald Reagan’s election as governor of California in 1966.

It should have been no surprise; Reagan had vowed to “clean up that mess in Berkeley,” harping about “sexual orgies so vile that I cannot describe them to you.” Reagan proposed tuition to make the bums work so they would be too tired to carry picket signs.

In office, Reagan reduced state funding for higher education, and laid the foundation for a shift to a tuition-based funding model. When students protested Reagan called the National Guard and crushed them.

Reagan shifted the political debate over the meaning and purpose of public higher education in America. He declared war on the poor, proposing to throw the “bums” off welfare. According to Reagan, universities along with an expensive welfare program were a problem and they took California dangerously close to socialism.

Tom Hayden in an article on Mario Savio argued that “The current era of privatization and neoliberalism was born in Berkeley as a countermovement to the ’60s.” We did not see what was on the horizon, too caught up with our perceived victories perhaps to see a reaction building that would change higher education.

At the time, however, we were too young, naive or preoccupied with the Vietnam War, campus turmoil and the excitement of times to recognize the significance of the changes. They were slow in coming – by 1970 the fees had increased to $50 a semester, which was affordable.

Berkeley was temporarily galvanized by the firing of Clark Kerr. In response to student protests, Reagan ordered 2200 national guardsmen onto the Berkeley campus. Because of the prestige of Berkeley and UCLA for all intents and purposes privatization began earlier there with the admission of significant numbers of out-of-state and international students and an avalanche of lucrative private and public grants.

Meanwhile, by 1959, San Fernando Valley State was no longer a satellite of Los Angeles State College. It was situated in a moderately conservative and overwhelmingly white suburbia. Spurred by freeways, it grew tremendously during the 1960s, and by June 1972 the college officially named itself California State University, Northridge.

My first student teaching assignment was in 1957 at SFVSC through LA State College. Over the years, I taught junior high, high school and at Pierce College in the Valley. Active in theLatin American Civic Association and the Mexican American Political Association, we lobbied SFVSC for programs. There were a few sympathetic professors such as Betty Brady and of course, Julian Nava.

Valley State was a Mormon institution, controlled by a Mormon hierarchy. The professors wore white shirts, ties and coats. There was a faculty dining hall (cafeteria). At the time I did not realize it, but although we were a cow college, there was a feeling of tradition. Most faculty members respected the liberal traditions of a university education, and consequently reacted toward any threat to these traditions. Governance was part of that mindset and it was defended by the faculty senate.

The selection of James Cleary in 1969 marked a transition from Mormon rule. Cleary was regarded as a genuine scholar, although his publications largely rested on his editorship of Robert’s Rules of Law. He had been a professor and administrator at the University of Wisconsin/Madison. He was Catholic and looked presidential, always with his pipe in hand.

He led CSUN to 1992. Cleary, for all of his warts, respected faculty governance and fought for the autonomy of the university. I cannot remember an instance during his tenure when he overturned the decision of the faculty senate. However, changes were taking place during the 1970s like the draconian Proposition 13. He and other administrators unlike today’s managers used their moral authority to slow down encroachments.
The decline in the traditions of the liberal university and the protection of faculty of the principle of faculty governance in all probability was facilitated by the decline of tenured track faculty and the rise in the number of part-time faculty.

By 1977, enrollment at CSUN cost $95. Eleven years later it rose to a $342 tuition fee. Until the early 1990s, tuition and fees remained low. Nevertheless, tuition and fees more than doubled from the late 1980s to early 1990s. By fall 2006, the University had tuition of $1,260. Spurred by the 2008 recession it went to $2,000 per year. By 2011–12, it rose to over $6,000 per year at CSU. ($3,272.00 in the spring 2015).

It is merely speculative, but the decline in the traditions of the liberal university and the protection of faculty of the principle of faculty governance in all probability was facilitated by the decline of tenured track faculty and the rise in the number of part-time faculty. There were also structural changes; full time faculty was only required to be on campus two days a week. Today, many professors lack a sense of place; it is a job rather than an institution.

Administrators have also changed. They are not cut in the image of the pipe smoking Cleary, and not one since his departure can be called a scholar. They are what the neoliberal-privatized university require, overseers. Under their rule, faculty governance has declined and even the department chairs are today part of the administrative staff.

In a recent address to the faculty, Provost Harry Hellenbrand titled “Molting Season” defended the privatization of CSUN and rationalized the increase in tuition: “Yes, CSUN Charges students more than they paid fifty years ago. But factor in $150,000,000 more in aid.”

This echoes CSUN President Dianne Harrison who told members of Chicana/o Studies that students could afford high tuition and dorm costs because they were getting Pell Grants. It is cynical and it is important to note that even the conservative Chancellor Glenn S. Dumke had opposed the notion of tuition.

The “slow death of Public Higher Education” has come about from within. The managers have benefitted handsomely in terms of salaries, staff increases and slush funds. When a president comes in many of her housing perks are paid by non-state funds that do not have the restraints or scrutiny of state funds. Administrators have slush funds from which they can pay off cronies.

On the CSUN campus we have a private university that “molted” from the public institution. Privatization has contributed to the escalation of student costs with less and less public funds expended on education.

Privatization and neoliberalism that began in Berkeley as a countermovement to the ’60s is today in full swing. They are bringing about changes that will end public higher education and limit access to public higher Ed to the upper 50 percent.

Meanwhile, academicians will put together the narrative of the privatization and death of the public university. The patterns are easily discerned. More difficult will be to recognize and describe the changes that they have brought about in we the people.


Rudy Acuña

The opinions expressed here are solely the author's and do not reflect the opinions or beliefs of the LA Progressive.

The Origin of Student Debt: Reagan Adviser Warned Free College Would Create A Dangerous “Educated Proletariat”

Friends:

Check out this excellent piece on this history of student tuition and student debt. Readers may be surprised to read that 

"Student debt...played a minor role in American life through the 1960s, increased during the Reagan administration and then shot up after the 2007-2009 Great Recession as states made huge cuts to funding for their college systems." 

This piece takes us back to a historical moment during the Nixon Administration where charging college tuition, though disguised as cost-saving, was ideologically about college's not creating a dangerous "educated proletariat." Today, this rhetoric would get cast as "anti-Wokism," illustrating how the very same elitist politics reinvent themselves as weapons against not just the working, but also the aspiring, middle class.

Today, some act as if student tuition were ordained by God when the historical record shows it as an artifact of ultra-conservative politicians' views of the late 1960s and early 1970s where they felt threatened by the existence of a well-educated populace.

We need a total re-think of higher education today where higher education is a right, as opposed to a privilege, not unlike K-12 schooling. Moreover, it should be viewed positively, as the constructive force that it has largely been—both for individuals and society, as a whole. For this, we must all vote for candidates amenable to such proposals as canceling student debt and College for All. Here is one such proposal: H.R.2861 - America’s College Promise Act of 2021 Also check out this piece in Newsweek by Dr. Denisa Gándara.

In the wake of the U.S. Supreme Court recently striking down Biden's student debt plan (Stratfor, Gerstein, & Frazier, 2023), we need to support Biden's decision to use the Higher Education Act as a vehicle for canceling this debt (Bazail Eimil, 2023). A helpful resource in the struggle is The Debt Collective https://debtcollective.org/, an organization that is calling for debt abolition and relief, and holding the U.S. Department of Education accountable for the student debt crisis.

Thanks to Dr. Kevin Kumashiro for sharing.

-Angela Valenzuela 

#CollegeForAll #CancelStudentDebt 

References

Bazail Eimil, E. (2023, June 30). White House pushes forward on student loan forgiveness in wake of SCOTUS ruling, Politico.

Gándara, D. Now Let's Make College Free | Opinion, Newsweek

H.R.2861 - America’s College Promise Act of 2021

Stratford, M. Gerstein, J. & Frazier, K. (2023, June 30) Supreme Court strikes down Biden’s student debt relief plan

Gov. Ronald Reagan explains his requested shutdown of California’s higher education system in Sacramento, Calif. on May 6, 1970. Photo: Bettmann Archive

THE ORIGIN OF STUDENT DEBT: REAGAN ADVISER WARNED FREE COLLEGE WOULD CREATE A 

DANGEROUS “EDUCATED PROLETARIAT”

In 1970, Roger Freeman, who also worked for Nixon, revealed the right’s motivation for coming decades of attacks on higher education.

by John Schwartz | Aug. 25, 2022 | The Intercept

WITH THE vociferous debate over President Joe Biden’s announcement that the federal government will cancel a portion of outstanding student debt, it’s important to understand how Americans came to owe the current cumulative total of more than $1.6 trillion for higher education.

In 1970, Ronald Reagan was running for reelection as governor of California. He had first won in 1966 with confrontational rhetoric toward the University of California public college system and executed confrontational policies when in office. In May 1970, Reagan had shut down all 28 UC and Cal State campuses in the midst of student protests against the Vietnam War and the U.S. bombing of Cambodia. On October 29, less than a week before the election, his education adviser Roger A. Freeman spoke at a press conference to defend him.

Freeman’s remarks were reported the next day in the San Francisco Chronicle under the headline “Professor Sees Peril in Education.” According to the Chronicle article, Freeman said, “We are in danger of producing an educated proletariat. … That’s dynamite! We have to be selective on who we allow [to go to college].”

“If not,” Freeman continued, “we will have a large number of highly trained and unemployed people.” Freeman also said — taking a highly idiosyncratic perspective on the cause of fascism —“that’s what happened in Germany. I saw it happen.”

Freeman was born in 1904 in Vienna, Austria, and emigrated to the United States after the rise of Hitler. An economist who became a longtime fixture in conservative politics, he served on the White House staff during both the Dwight Eisenhower and Richard Nixon administrations. In 1970 he was seconded from the Nixon administration to work on Reagan’s campaign. He was also a senior fellow at Stanford’s conservative Hoover Institution. In one of his books, he asked “can Western Civilization survive” what he believed to be excessive government spending on education, Social Security, etc.

A core theme of Reagan’s first gubernatorial campaign in 1966 was resentment toward California’s public colleges, in particular UC Berkeley, with Reagan repeatedly vowing “to clean up the mess” there. Berkeley, then nearly free to attend for California residents, had become a national center of organizing against the Vietnam War. Deep anxiety about this reached the highest levels of the U.S. government. John McCone, the head of the CIA, requested a meeting with J. Edgar Hoover, head of the FBI, to discuss “communist influence” at Berkeley, a situation that “definitely required some corrective action.”

During the 1966 campaign, Reagan regularly communicated with the FBI about its concerns about Clark Kerr, the president of the entire University of California system. Despite requests from Hoover, Kerr had not cracked down on Berkeley protesters. Within weeks of Reagan taking office, Kerr was fired. A subsequent FBI memo stated that Reagan was “dedicated to the destruction of disruptive elements on California campuses.”

Reagan pushed to cut state funding for California’s public colleges but did not reveal his ideological motivation. Rather, he said, the state simply needed to save money. To cover the funding shortfall, Reagan suggested that California public colleges could charge residents tuition for the first time. This, he complained, “resulted in the almost hysterical charge that this would deny educational opportunities to those of the most moderate means. This is obviously untrue. … We made it plain that tuition must be accompanied by adequate loans to be paid back after graduation.”

The success of Reagan’s attacks on California public colleges inspired conservative politicians across the U.S. Nixon decried “campus revolt.” Spiro Agnew, his vice president, proclaimed that thanks to open admissions policies, “unqualified students are being swept into college on the wave of the new socialism.”

Prominent conservative intellectuals also took up the charge. Privately one worried that free education “may be producing a positively dangerous class situation” by raising the expectations of working-class students. Another referred to college students as “a parasite feeding on the rest of society” who exhibited a “failure to understand and to appreciate the crucial role played [by] the reward-punishment structure of the market.” The answer was “to close off the parasitic option.”

In practice, this meant to the National Review, a “system of full tuition charges supplemented by loans which students must pay out of their future income.”

In retrospect, this period was the clear turning point in America’s policies toward higher education. For decades, there had been enthusiastic bipartisan agreement that states should fund high-quality public colleges so that their youth could receive higher education for free or nearly so. That has now vanished. In 1968, California residents paid a $300 yearly fee to attend Berkeley, the equivalent of about $2,000 now. Now tuition at Berkeley is $15,000, with total yearly student costs reaching almost $40,000.

Student debt, which had played a minor role in American life through the 1960s, increased during the Reagan administration and then shot up after the 2007-2009 Great Recession as states made huge cuts to funding for their college systems.

That brings us to today. Biden’s actions, while positive, are merely a Band-Aid on a crisis 50 years in the making. In 1822, founding father James Madison wrote to a friend that “the liberal appropriations made by the Legislature of Kentucky for a general system of Education cannot be too much applauded. … Enlightened patriotism … is now providing for the State a Plan of Education embracing every class of Citizens.”

“Knowledge will forever govern ignorance,” Madison explained, “and a people who mean to be their own governors must arm themselves with the power which knowledge gives.” Freeman and Reagan and their compatriots agreed with Madison’s perspective but wanted to prevent Americans from gaining this power. If we want to take another path, the U.S. will have to recover a vision of a well-educated populace not as a terrible threat, but as a positive force that makes the nation better for everyone — and so should largely be paid for by all of us.